


old ghosts, breathing down your neck

by cosmicmon



Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Dreams and Nightmares, Experimental Style, Gen, POV Second Person, Psychological Torture, Torture, i swear to god the next thing i post will be more pleasant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-24
Updated: 2020-11-24
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:35:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27703544
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cosmicmon/pseuds/cosmicmon
Summary: The best punishment for terrible mistakes is the kind of guilt that eats away at your insides and keeps you up at night.-another short, experimental work for an oc
Kudos: 2





	old ghosts, breathing down your neck

This is a dream you have often. 

You are back in the dungeon of Dunwall tower, strapped into the chair the torturers use to keep prisoners from killing themselves or others. The interrogator asks you the same questions over and over —

 _Where are the other insurrectionist cells?_

_Where did you acquire your weapons?_

_Who was feeding you information?_

— and when you remain silent she jerks her head at someone you can never quite make out but feels like a knife at your back. The knife then

stubs out a cigarette on your neck, or–

sticks a hot poker into your mouth, or–

shocks you with electricity, and then–

everything starts over from the beginning. Sometimes you get lucky; the dream repeats this pattern endlessly until you finally wrench yourself from sleep.

When you are not lucky, which is most of the time, what happens instead is this: the interrogator and the knife standing at your back vanish — but in their place is _him._ He is on his knees with his hands tied behind his back, pretty blue eyes glistening with tears. 

He says; "Valentín, my love, they'll let us go free–"

You want to lose your mind with impotent rage but you can’t. You never can. His pain rips you in two even when you know it is feigned.

"Valentín, you must give in, I can't bear to see them hurt you–"

"Valentín, please I love you, we could be together–"

His face is a twisted mask of anguish and pain and it is not enough to make you forget that he is _lying_ but it is enough to make you remember that you _loved_ him — you _still_ love him. 

"Valentín, my darling, don't you want to live–"

"Valentín, you know how much I love you–"

"Valentín, they'll hurt me–"

Each lie he sobs in his broken voice pounds in your skull, over and over, over and over. The interrogator returns to the chorus and the knife at your back punctuates the end of each verse.

"Valentín, don't you love me–"

_Where are the other insurrectionist cells?_

A cigarette crushes into your neck.

"Valentín, why do you hate me–"

_Where did you acquire your weapons?_

The poker sears what is left of your tongue.

"Valentín, what did I do to deserve this–"

_Who was feeding you information?_

Your body convulses out of control.

"Valentín, how could you–"

The dream starts to loop, relentlessly, each repetition smearing the lines between each tormentor until they are the same creature and its burning voice snarls at you; _"Give up, Valentín, my darling, just give_ **_up–"_ **

When you wake, you are always covered in sweat and shivering no matter how warm it is, and you have to stumble out of bed so you can get sick in the bucket you keep by your nightstand. What you do after changes; sometimes you crawl out onto the roof and smoke until the stubs start to clog the gutter, sometimes you drag yourself down to the kitchen and dig out a bottle of whatever alcohol you can find, sometimes you just curl up into a ball and cry yourself hoarse — but no matter what, the rest of the night is spent with old ghosts breathing down your neck.

**Author's Note:**

> "i fought for morley in the insurrection and all i got was this t-shirt and also lots of recurring nightmares" -valentín mikhailovich chesnokov of the dread ship red sky at morning


End file.
